Five first impressions you may witness when entering Vietnam

You may have heard a lot about what to be noted when visiting Vietnam, scams to avoid and experiences not to be missed. However, there is something bizarre and interesting without anyone warning you. Here are some fun facts about Vietnam, not every Vietnam tour operator tells you before your trip.

Interesting things in Vietnam

Smoking culture (Alert: huge bong mention!)

It is an obvious fact that heavy smokers are found in almost every single corner around the globe. However, in this post, we are not talking about some men trying to light up their cigarettes. Walking around the city of Hanoi, it is not hard to find a group of men sitting on the tiny plastic chairs in the middle of a frozen winter night, busy chatting while holding a huge smoky bong. In some countries, using bongs in public is not such a common thing, yet it is totally opposite in Vietnam.

Blowing a bong

The enormous smoking equipment is believed to help you stay warm during the chilling winter days. Some say such habit even brings you a better benefit of digestion. Yet whether this is real or not would be a huge doubt! If you have not tried such an experiment before, why not give it a go when in Hanoi with the best Vietnam tour operator you have found?

Helmet

You may have heard a lot about the intense madness of Vietnam’s traffic. This comes along with a surprising fact about the country sitting on the 4th place on the chart of top nations consuming motorbikes and scooters.

Cap-like helmet

As a matter of fact, putting on authorized helmets while using electronic two-wheel vehicles on the roads of Vietnam is a must-do act, if not compulsory! However, you may find it a bit funny when many cute-looking and exceptional helmet models are widely used and favored by Vietnamese of all ages. For instance, women with ponytails tend to have their tied hair flown in the air through a little hole decorated at the back of a cap-like helmet. Take this as an interesting Vietnam tour operator review and why not try to grab one as a souvenir back home?

Honking

The very next testament showcasing Vietnam’s intense traffic comes from the honking culture on the street. In Saigon, the country’s biggest metropolis, drivers sometimes tend to honk for no good sake. It can be a reminder of green lights having five seconds to go, it can mean the scooter situated in the front is stuck because he or she is blocked by another car and obviously, in the end, no one can move.

A crossroad in Saigon

Hence, at some points, the honk seems to bring no effect at all, and sometimes cause a little annoyance. Yet as time goes by, this is somehow a small fraction of our daily life and those from Saigon in their great escape to the rural villages tend to miss this disturbing sound some days.

Korean-inclined impact on the young

This is totally understandable when K-culture has expanded massively and almost reached a large part of the World. As a close neighbor, Vietnam is one of the top countries in the area that has adopted a huge influence from South Korea, especially in the fields of cosmetics and food.

Young Vietnamese girls love to have super light skin, if not saying, pale, by covering themselves head to toes in a ninja-like outfit, purchasing skin lightening cosmetic lines, dressing up and having their hair done at a Korean idol. However, apparently not every single Vietnamese love to follow the crowd, yet witnessing such phenomena would be something you should expect before visiting the country with a Vietnam local tour operator.

Cheap beer

Shared by WHO back in 2014, Vietnam was ranked 94 out of 194 beer-consuming members. Even though the country has not led the chart by far as the biggest beer-drinking nation, such tasty alcoholic drink comes in a pretty surprising fare. The average cost of a beer-can is around $0.9, and that price varies depending on each different restaurant or bistro.

Beer feast in Vietnam

You may want to read this once again before a Vietnam tour operator welcomes you to this country. These are totally interesting to witness and experience, which makes Vietnam imposingly standout against its neighbors in the area.